Measuring Walking and Cycling Using the PABS (Pedestrian and Bicycling Survey) Approach: A Low-Cost Survey Method for Local Communities (2009-2010)

Initiatives to spur more walking and cycling have become increasingly prominent nationwide as one strategy communities are using to tackle the problems of greenhouse gas emissions, traffic congestion, resident quality of life, and public health concerns. As local governments face hard choices about which programs to fund, decision makers, planners, and residents all seek to understand if proposed policies to increase bicycling and walking—modes referred to as “active travel”—will actually work. However, most communities have unreliable means to know how many active travel trips occur in their jurisdictions, let alone how the numbers may change over time. To help fill this knowledge gap, this project developed a low-budget survey method and related sampling strategy for communities to easily, affordably, and reliably document the amount of local walking and cycling happening among their residents.

One of the most important contributions of this research project is that the Pedestrian and Bicycling Survey (PABS) instrument has been tested for reliability across administrations. The PABS tool achieved adequate to excellent reliability for most questions, creating a useful instrument and a baseline for future comparison with other instruments.

This project was led by Kevin Krizek, Ann Forsyth, and Asha Agrawal.. More information about the project, including the final report and version 1.0 of the manual, can be found at: http://transweb.sjsu.edu/project/2907.html